"I thought I could do something like young Michael Corleone wanted to do: Go completely legitimate. You remember that part?"
Castillo nodded again.
"I reasoned that if I gave up the more profitable aspects of my businesses-really gave them up-and maintained what you would call a low profile here-"
"I get the picture," Castillo interrupted.
"Not quite, I don't think, friend Charley. And I think it's important that you do."
"Go ahead."
"I have been using you since you came into my life, sometimes successfully, sometimes at a price. You recall how we met, Herr Gossinger?"
"On the Cobenzl in Vienna," Castillo said. "I thought you had stolen an airplane."
"You came very close to dying that night, friend Charley. When I heard that you wanted to interview me, I thought I would send a message to the press that looking into my affairs was not acceptable and was indeed very dangerous."
I believe him.
But why is he bringing that up now?
"But then Howard found out that you were really an American intelligence officer-Kennedy was very good at what he did; it's sad he turned out to be so weak and greedy-and you were using the name Karl Gossinger as a cover.
"I found that interesting. So I decided to meet you in person. And when you suggested that-I love this American phrase-we could scratch each other's back, I went along, to see where that would go-"
"Cutting to the chase," Castillo interrupted, "I would never have found that 727 without you. And I made good on my promise. I got the CIA and the FBI off your back."
"So you did, proving yourself intelligent, capable, and a man of your word."
"I'm going to blush if you keep this up."
"You'll remember certainly that the Southern Cone, especially Argentina, never came up in Vienna. You found the 727 where I told you it would be, in Central America."
"Yeah, I remember."
"When that transaction between us was over, I thought it had gone extraordinarily well. You got what you wanted. And I got what I wanted, the CIA and the FBI to leave me alone. Which was very important to me, as I was already establishing myself here and-being pragmatic-I knew that if they were still looking for me, they would have inevitably found me."
"And then I showed up here," Castillo said.
Pevsner nodded.
"Now that we both know who Howard Kennedy really was," Pevsner went on, "I don't think it is surprising that when you bumped into Howard in the elevator at the Four Seasons, his first reaction was to suggest to me that we had made a mistake in Vienna and it was now obviously the time to rectify that omission."
You mean, whack me.
"He suggested we could have our Russian friends do it, so there would be no connection with me. My initial reaction was to go along-I naturally thought that you had turned on me, and had come here to demand something of me.
"But, again, I was curious, and told Howard that that would wait until we learned what you wanted from me. So I told Howard to put a bag over your head and bring you out to my house in Buena Vista in Pilar. The bag offended you. I understood. So I told Howard to bring you anyway. You could be dealt with at Buena Vista.
"While I was waiting for you, I realized that I was really sorry I had misjudged you and regretted that I would have to deal with the problem. The strange truth seemed to be that I liked you more than I knew I should."
Giving me an "Indian beauty mark" in the center of my forehead with a small-caliber, soft-nose pistol bullet…that's how you were going to "deal with the problem."
"If you try to kiss me, Alek, I'll kick your scrotum over the chandelier."
"You are…impossible!" Pevsner said.
"But lovable."